When she felt his spirit, she stopped in her steps.

Overlord.

Yan Shoumei spun around to see him wave lazily to her as he walked away.

The Forest Sage had given up on Ziel halfway through their training, but that was understandable. Ziel had given up on himself long before.

He stood in the center of the Uncrowned King arena, letting the cheers and shouts of the audience wash over him. The arena was an elaborate machine of crashing steel and falling stones, a three-dimensional maze ripe with aura of force and earth.

He would have to navigate it carefully, and he was certain the shape of the arena had been designed to encourage mobility. On its own, this fight was likely to be nothing more than two sacred artists crashing hammers into one another until one fell over, and the Ninecloud Court wanted a more interesting fight. Especially after the last round.

Northstrider was here, and his opponent was on his way. Brother Aekin wore a dark stone mask carved to resemble some kind of snarling monster, the right eye of which glowed with a bright yellow light. His robes were black and brown, representing the Wandering Titan’s cult: the Abyssal Palace.

When Ziel had learned they weren’t matching him up against the last remaining Stormcaller, that had sapped even more of his motivation.

Even now, he wondered why he bothered. It would take the attention of multiple Monarchs to restore him to his former power, which he would only get if he won the tournament. Not only were the odds too low to bet on, what would he do with the power of an Archlord?

He just wanted his own spirit to stop hurting. Emriss Silentborn’s treatment had helped, but it needed a long time to do its work. Rather than fight, he wanted to go home and wait for that elixir to slowly heal him.

Even if it would only ever make him an Underlord.

But he did have one more hope.

He glanced at the Arelius tower, with its blocks of white stone held up by fluted columns. Tiberian Arelius had been known for his spiritual attacks, and in fact the Sage of Calling Storms had abused some of the Arelius Monarch’s research to damage Ziel’s soul in the first place.

Tiberian had created a spiritual restoration process to undo long-term soul damage: the Pure Storm Baptism. Once, Ziel had hunted for it, until he had learned that the Arelius Monarch was dead.

Only days ago, the Arelius family had contacted him. If he defeated Brother Aekin, they would ensure that their prize in the next round was one of the few remaining Pure Storm Baptism courses.

Without Tiberian alive, they couldn’t replace those. Any they used would be gone forever.

And it wouldn’t restore his power as an Archlord, but it would allow him to live as a perfectly healthy Underlord far faster than Emriss’ elixir.

With the two combined, he might even be able to advance again.

He had already passed his soulfire revelations, so his body would be even stronger than any other Underlord’s. And now the revelations couldn’t bottleneck his progress if he did manage to advance again. It was a great offer.

Too great to pass up. He knew that in his head, but his heart wasn’t convinced.

He’d been worthless for too long. Nothing could turn that around now. The belief was engraved in his bones.

Cylinders crashed to the ground around him, casting off force aura and kicking up wind that billowed his cloak. He leaned on his hammer, facing Brother Aekin.

Northstrider asked them both if they were prepared, and Ziel wondered if anyone got to this point in the competition and required another minute for preparation.

Finally, the Monarch ordered them to begin.

The Path of the Dawn Oath had only two techniques, and Ziel used them both.

The Stone Anchor, his full-body Enforcer technique, ran through him like iron bars reinforcing his skeleton. It bound him to the ground, so that with stable footing he could stand as though nailed in place.

But the cornerstone of his Path was the Oathsign technique. He Forged eleven green, shining runes in a circle that hung in the air in front of him.

This circle hardened force aura into a solid barrier that stopped physical impacts.

Brother Aekin’s hammer crashed into the barrier and cracked it, ruining the Forged symbols, but the blow was stopped.

Ziel’s own hammer, driven with the force of his Stone Anchor, slammed into Aekin an instant later.

The Dreadgod cultist blocked it with one upraised arm, sliding a few feet back instead of flying across the arena. A full-body Enforcer technique flowed through him as well, appearing outwardly as a yellow light covering him like armor.

They each gripped a hammer in both hands.

Aekin’s weapon looked like it had been hewn from rough stone, and it gave off the pressure of an Archlord weapon. Ziel’s steel hammer had been made for an Archlord as well, but there was no way he could activate its binding. His madra channels were already screaming at him after using only a handful of techniques.

As he expected, he should give up.

But while he was here, he might as well give the fight a token effort.

New scripts encircled his wrists and ankles, stimulating the blood aura in his body and strengthening him briefly. He kicked off from the ground, launching himself into the air and landing on a platform that drifted across the arena on a cushion of force aura.

He expected Aekin to follow him, but the Abyssal Palace priest pulled a second weapon out of his soulspace. It was shaped something like a crossbow made from polished wood, though if he was storing it in his soulspace it had to be very dense madra.

A launcher construct made into a sacred instrument. That was rare, as launcher constructs typically didn’t get any stronger when powered directly. A sword produced more power in accordance with its user, but launchers had static output.

Globs of a dark, oily liquid shot out of the construct. Ziel had already dropped the scripts around his limbs and switched back to the Stone Anchor, so it would be a moment before he could dodge again. He had no choice but to block.

A new script-circle appeared in front of him, this one designed to seize madra rather than aura. The globs of oil struck the circle and were sprayed out the sides, away from him.

But a few droplets landed on the ends of his cloak and splattered onto his feet. They began to grow, drawing strength from his blood and sticking him to the flying surface.

He broke them quickly, but Aekin had already leaped onto the platform, and a rush of his yellow madra shoved Ziel backwards.

The duel took another minute or two, but Ziel never recovered.

Aekin kept him on the back foot as Ziel grew more and more exhausted, his own techniques burdening him too much to continue.

Eventually, he couldn’t support his own madra and Aekin crushed his head.

Ziel was remade from white madra in his waiting room. Alone.

Shame and disappointment draped over him in a crushing weight.

That had been pathetic.

Would the spectators think that was the limit of his abilities? His master would have disowned him if she’d witnessed that sort of behavior. What would the people who saw him think about the Dawnwing Sect?

Ziel rested his head in his hands. His horns were cool against his fingers.

What was wrong with him?

He had gone into this match knowing he was going to lose. Expecting to lose. Fifteen minutes ago, he’d been fine with it.

He couldn’t even count on his own heart to be consistent.

No matter how many times he was certain that the Archlord of the Dawnwing Sect was dead, he always found another scrap of that man clinging to life. Ziel should have no pride left to be hurt, and yet here he was.